Droughts and Heat Waves

It's something of a relief, if a mixed one, that the drought has surged into the role of the latest scourge to freak out California. It's a relief in the sense that it means that the California economy, so recently frighteningly rocky, has receded as the top-billed problem facing the state, even if the recovery is more patchy and vulnerable than anyone might wish. But it's mixed, of course, because the drought carries its own dangers, and the ultimate solution — rain — remains wholly out of the power of politicians or everyday Californians. Water and Power is The Times' guide to the drought. Sign up to get the free newsletter >> Fresh signs...

Related "Droughts and Heat Waves" Articles

It's something of a relief, if a mixed one, that the drought has surged into the role of the latest scourge to freak out California.
It's a relief in the sense that it means that the California economy, so recently frighteningly rocky, has receded as the...

Last fall, farmers working the flat land along the Colorado River outside Blythe, Calif., harvested a lucrative crop of oranges, lettuce and alfalfa from fields irrigated with river water. But that wasn't their only source of income. They made almost as...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein filed her long-awaited legislative response to California's water crisis on Wednesday, hoping to broker a compromise that has eluded Congress through four years of fallow fields and brown lawns.
Feinstein's proposal would funnel...

Oregon Gov. Kate Brown has declared drought emergencies in 23 of the state’s 36 counties and ordered state agencies to conserve water as another parched year threatens fish and forests, limits agriculture and recreation, and worsens the risk of wildfire....

July — already one of the wettest in California's history — is expected to go out with one more drenching.
Forecasters say a monsoonal flow could hit Southern California on Wednesday, bringing more rain, thunder, lightning and muggy conditions...

A 20-year struggle to protect a rare bottom-feeding fish from extinction appears headed toward resolution as Inland Empire cities and water agencies are asking the court of last resort to intervene.
Two cities and 10 water agencies say they will petition...

Santa Barbara City Council members on Tuesday unanimously approved spending $55 million to reactivate a mothballed desalination plant that could provide the city with nearly a third of its drinking water.
The Charles E. Meyer Desalination Facility...

For drought watchers, it has become known as the May miracle.
At a time when water levels in Lake Mead were getting so low that officials prepared for drastic cutbacks, it started raining. A series of powerful storms pummeled the mountains that feed...

The curtain appeared to fall this week on Tom Selleck’s latest role: that of the suspected recipient of unlawful water deliveries.The Calleguas Municipal Water District had accused the “Magnum P.I.” and “Blue Bloods” star of having truckloads of water...

On July 10, the Times' editorial board wrote in opposition to the House's latest response to the drought.
I strongly disagree with the editorial. The House’s bill responding to the drought accomplishes much more than the editorial board gives credit for,...

Californians should brace themselves for one of the strongest El Niño events to hit the Pacific Ocean in years.
Unusually warmer temperatures of equatorial water in the Pacific and shifting winds continued through July, indicating that El...

The latest version of a bill by House Republicans to override California's management of its water system and undermine environmental protections — in the name of emergency drought relief and food security — is longer and more detailed than the ones...

When Gov. Jerry Brown called on drought-weary Californians to reconsider their love of thirsty, nonnative landscaping, some businesses and homeowners responded by tearing out their once-cherished lawns.
Additional motivation for swapping out grass for...

Thousands of beachgoers will soon feel the drought's impact in the dry shower heads of dozens of state beaches.
State park officials ordered the outdoor showers at 38 state beaches, many of them in Southern California, shut off as of July 15 to...

It had all the makings of a latter-day water war, pitting a Ventura County water district against actor Tom Selleck.
The Calleguas Municipal Water District accused Selleck of illegally moving water over district boundaries from Thousand Oaks to his...

The vehicle that officials say was used to pilfer water from a Ventura County water district’s fire hydrant was a white water tender truck, not a red Ferrari driven by a mustachioed man in a Detroit Tigers baseball cap and a Hawaiian shirt.
But in a...

Blocks from the U.S. border on a recent afternoon, inside a packed auditorium, the farmers' voices rose with their anxious questions. Water from the Colorado River has long been the lifeline for their fields of cotton, wheat and alfalfa, and they were...

The Sleepy Hollow fire raced down the crisp Sage Hills, straight toward the Broadview neighborhood in the apple capital of the world. Flames shot high into the night, torching 29 homes and causing hundreds of people to flee. Then the fire did something no...

My first lawn in Southern California was at a Burbank rental where the landlord asked my husband and me to keep the yard watered. A dewy-eyed newbie to this end of the state, I thought, “Not a problem.” The landlord paid for the water and it was mid-1980s...

After using the so-called rain year — July to June — for more than 130 years to measure precipitation totals, National Weather Service stations in Southern California recently started using the "hydrological year" — October to September.
...